A Passion for Liberty
Tibor R. Machan @ Rational Review
Posts tagged Ayn Rand
Column on Is Capitalism Cruel?
Nov 19th
Is Capitalism Cruel?
Tibor R. Machan
Now this issues must always be dealt with comparatively–is capitalism cruel, harsh, heartless compared to what?
Some folks I know have maintained that compared to socialism, capitalism is indeed all these things but I just cannot buy it. Partly it’s because I have lived under at least one kind of socialism, the Soviet version, which, as only someone who has been living in a cave for a hundred years would deny, is brutal, never mind cruel, harsh, and heartless.
But let’s not focus on the worst case scenario of socialism. Let us take socialism “with a human face,” the sort that is usually associated with Sweden, France, Greece or some other country where the government manages much of the society’s economic affairs but doesn’t punish dissidents and ban freedom of speech. Are these bona fide socialist systems and are they gentle and kind to their population?
Again, compared to what? A fully free market, capitalist system in which everyone must live without resorting to extorting their support from others, without getting bailed out by the government with other people’s resources when they have mismanaged their financial affairs–is such a system more cruel than, say, democratic socialism?
Not really, not by a long shot. Any kind of socialism subjects the citizenry to coercive wealth redistribution and makes it impossible to accumulate wealth for oneself, one’s family, one’s enterprise thus impeding investment, savings and economic development. Instead people in socialist systems have to contend with being slowly bled to economic destitution unless they are savvy enough to circumvent all the damaging socialist practices (think here of George Soros). And, yes, there are quite a few people in socialist societies, even the harshest version of them, who manage to game the system. They may not openly attack their fellow citizens but because they game the system at the expense of these fellow citizens, those others are in fact–although sometimes not visibly–being seriously harmed.
These socialist systems with human faces manage to disguise their mistreatment of all those who are made to pay for the mistakes of many who become used to being taken care of, who feel they are entitled to endless help from the government, who don’t want to reach out to people and contend with the fact that generosity and charity must be voluntary whereas being on the dole is coercive but not easily noticed. Who is paying for those food stamps? The minimum wages one receives? The subsidies to farmers and all the rest of the costly welfare measures? No one can tell because it all goes through politicians and bureaucrats and they do not accept responsibility of how they treat the citizenry, for depriving Peter of what belongs to Peter and hand it to Paul (not before they skim a good deal off for themselves). (I develop this idea in my 1970 paper, “Justice and the Welfare State,” The Personalist.)
Moreover, many people judge socialism by the announced intentions of those who support the system, not by the actual consequences it produces throughout a society. All the unseen losses suffered because of the public mismanagement of the economy are overlooked and, instead, people often believe it is “the thought that counts.” But a little serious, disciplined thinking should soon reveal just what is going on and how what appears on superficial sight gentle and sweet becomes, instead, insidious and harmful.
Capitalism is up front about placing responsibility on free men and women and for this it gets a bad rep from those who are duped into thinking that one can tell the full content of a book by its fancy cover. Capitalism, unlike the welfare state, is more like parents who impose discipline and refuse to spoil their children however much they whine about it. Those who think the system is therefore a cruel one are comparable to teens who bellyache about their parents because they are more interested in justice than in mercy (which in exceptional cases is fine but not as a routine).
Because so many people have found free market capitalism too harsh, too cruel, or too mean, the system has never been allowed to function as it had been meant to by those who considered it best for a society’s economic well being, the likes of Adam Smith, Herbert Spencer, Ludwig von Mises, F. A. Hayek, Milton Friedman and Ayn Rand, among others. (Spencer, especially, got no end of grief because of sentiments like the following: “Sympathy with one in suffering suppresses, for the time being, remembrance of his transgressions….Those whose hardships are set forth in pamphlets and proclamations in sermons and speeches which echo throughout society, are assumed to be all worthy souls, grievously wronged; and none of them are thought of as bearing the penalties of their own misdeeds.” [Man versus the State, p.22].) Instead they followed the lead of John Maynard Keynes and insisted that people who mismanage their economic affairs are entitled to endless bailouts from the government.
Is this actually less cruel, less mean than the alternative, once all the results are considered? I seriously doubt it–just think of Greece, Portugal and, of course, the former Soviet colonies, as well of the members of America’s and many other nations’ future generations!
Column on Entitlement Foibles
Nov 10th
Entitlement Foibles
Tibor R. Machan
Gloating as they are too often wont to do, modern welfare state liberals are eager to point out that when it comes to proposing cuts in government spending, many who advocate it will not be specific. Even more telling, the liberals hold, is the fact that few if any will proclaim Social Security and Medicare a target of such cuts.
Perhaps this makes sense even when one sincerely wants the government to reduce it scope of involvement in society–to become, in short, truly limited as the American Founders wanted it to be and as, in any case, it ought to be. Let’s see.
Social security is often believed to be an insurance program, albeit one that is forced on people, yet still, the money taken for it is regarded by most who paid into it as theirs, so getting it out is naturally seen as simply having one’s funds returned in old age. Perhaps the idea of cutting social security is viewed with suspicion, as a way to rob people of what belongs to them and not as a reduction of government spending at all. Moreover, very likely few people have a clue just how the program could be removed from the government, how it might be privatized, especially after the “liberals”–it always sticks in my throat to call them that–have been working overtime demonizing privatization (even when it would only involve a relatively small percentage of the amount now taken from those who must pay into the system).
Medicare, too, has become something of a fixture and while there are pretty clear cut ways in which the free market could handle the insurance it amounts to, one can easily appreciate that few people have looked closely and hard at just how that might be done. Once people get used to being on the dole, especially for something the demagogues insist is their due by now, the very notion that they might get rid of it will strike most of them as implausible. Just float the idea of privatizing public education, or even public libraries, not to mention public parks and forests and airports! Most folks are unfamiliar with the work that has been done to show that all of this is quite feasible.
I remember when as a teen I was living in Germany where television and radio, not to mention trains and planes and virtually all other means of transport, were government run. To even suggest that this is not only economically silly but also an unjust sharing of benefits and burdens among people with very different needs and desire was met with incredulity. Surely this is to be expected of people whose ancestors were the mere subjects of various rulers, ones who rarely considered them to be self-responsible, who treated them as invalids or infants in most matters of concern.
In short, the governmental habit is difficult to shake–just like any narcotic–once one becomes acclimated to the benefits. The burdens are often hidden, or sold as part of being a citizen (or some similar ruse). And in comparison to how most people throughout the globe used to be treated by their rulers (!), the welfare state is a relatively mild oppressor. So when dismantling it is widely promoted to be cruel and nasty, the fact that doing so would be quite unusual, too, can make advocating such dismantling rather onerous, politically hazardous.
Ayn Rand once wrote a column, if I recall right, titled “It’s Earlier Than You Think,” suggesting that even Americans, with their unique and exceptional political tradition stressing individual rights, aren’t quite ready to accept the responsibility of living in a bona fide free country. They are still suffering from the illusions associated with ancient regimes and with modern statism, given how many reputable people–at colleges and universities and in the media across the land–clamor for these. (Just consider that nearly all of our educational institutions live off government!)
So it is a cheap shot to point out that critics of the bloated state do not always know quite what to say when asked for what in particular they would remove from its jurisdiction. Virtually everything, I think, can be done by people throughout the rest of society and government should only handle what the Founders said, “to secure our rights.” But this is still a revolutionary notion, not comfortable on the lips of politicians and the people considering supporting them
Column on Does the General Understand Freedom?
Sep 12th
Does the General Understand Freedom?
Tibor R. Machan
Here is the relevant exchange:
“[ABC News'] Martha Raddatz: Is this [the public and widely publicized possible burning of the Koran] something that could have a long-lasting effect on soldiers here?
General Petraeus: We fear it could. This could provide indelible images, images that in an Internet age will be non-biodegradable. They will always be in cyberspace and available for extremists to use to incite and inflame public opinion against our troopers and civilians.
“My job as a commander is to be concerned about the safety and security of our troopers. I think it’s important to provide an assessment of an incident that could jeopardize that safety, I think that’s very important. I think I have a moral obligation in fact to speak out on an issue like that….”
So this reminds me of how, in contrast to the general’s words, many sensible people reacted to the Danish cartoon episode: They thought it was perhaps unwise, unnecessarily provocative to publish them but once published, the issue became whether the newspapers had the right to do so. They did and this right needs to be defended, even while its particular exercise could be judged ill advised, even outright offensive.
Why not the same attitude about the prospect of burning the Koran? The fact that certain people may respond to it by violently lashing out against innocent individuals is lamentable. When one deals with people with a tribal mentality who lump everyone in a country or those of a certain religion or nationality or ethnic background together, never considering that these are different individuals whose deeds are their own, not those of the others in the group, one must realize that such reactions are possible even if totally irrational. Yet not by any means excusable. Muslims who join in are guilty of violence against innocent people, even if some other people who look like those innocent people have insulted them by burning the Koran.
Indeed, while it is an affront to burn what some billions of people regard as a holy book (to those people), it is not an attack on them but on their beliefs. Well, get used to it.
In a pluralistic world millions of people constantly denounce millions of other people, including by way of insulting the books they deem important. Millions of people have denounced the US Constitution and Declaration of Independence, various examples of important literature, and so forth. Books by Karl Marx, by Harriet Beecher Stowe (who wrote Uncle Tom’s Cabin), Ayn Rand and by thousands of others have gotten condemned as well as praised. But, as that wise saying has it, “Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me.” Indeed, denouncing people is something acrimonious but peaceful, as is offending them, and in a civilized world one is free to do what is peaceful however offensive it may be.
This, unfortunately, has been overlooked, even implicitly denied, in many regions of the world, including in the West where politically incorrect language is often deemed to be legally actionable. When the thought someone has while committing a crime, a so called hate crime, is punishable, then it is difficult to reject the thinking about offensive albeit peaceful language and deeds in evidence among many, many Muslims. It is wrong, but so is the thinking that supports punishing more severely a crime deemed to be motivated by hate than the crime without that motivation or motivated by something else. Such is the result of faulty thinking–one cannot cherry pick what inconsistencies one will accept and which are those one will reject. They must all go!
General Petraeus sadly got it wrong when he wants to shut down the Koran burning on the grounds that some will react to it irrationally. Sure, the burning should not happen because it is a needlessly provocative deed but no one should be forcibly stopped from uttering even the most provocative, blasphemous words or carrying out even the most insulting but peaceful deeds. One has a right to be wrong in a free society and public officials may have to cope with the results, including the perpetration of irrational reactions from people who don’t get it, who don’t understand what freedom entails.
Column on My Pitch for Some Solid Selfishness
May 7th
My Pitch for Some Solid Selfishness
Tibor R. Machan
Hardly anyone will dispute that most folks who chime in about ethics consider selfishness wrong. There have been exceptions in history and some of the most prominent ethical philosophers, such as Socrates and Aristotle, can even be said to have been ethical egoists or at least ones who championed the moral virtue of prudence as a vital one for living a good human life. But after some significant changes in how human nature began to be understood, being selfish or self-interested–or even prudent–started to be scoffed at, treated as a moral liability, not worthy of praise but of blame.
Of course, even after this, using one’s common sense showed that being selfish is what most of us are, normally, routinely, and quite benignly. When folks awake in the morning they proceed to begin to take good care of themselves before reaching out to help others, for example. (Just as that announcement would have it on air planes, first help yourself and then others in case there’s loss of oxygen.) But apart from such common sense support, selfishness gets little respect (other than perhaps from psychotherapists who usually don’t advise their clients not to care about themselves!).
So while selfishness is widely opposed by such official moralists as priests, ministers, politicians, and pundits, most people will choose to be selfish instead of selfless. And by this they do not intend to be mean toward others, only to put themselves first on the list of their priorities. And in that spirit, even if in opposition to the moralizers, I want to give support to the virtue of prudence or even selfishness (something only Ayn Rand had the courage to affirm in her book by that title). I am not interested here in developing a full blown morality or ethics only to point out that in times of virtually daily disaster stories from all corners of the globe near or far, it is a very good idea to keep being focused on what will benefit one’s life, how one can stay well and happy rather than distressed and frightened.
For one thing, “follow my old recipe”–to quote Socrates in a similar discussion–when it comes to checking out the daily news. Once having gotten through the half hour or hour long newscasts–via TV, radio or some other source–and having perused the newspapers and magazines, all of which have a pretty predictable tendency to be filled with reports of horror and misery, one should spend maybe at least a half hour checking out TV’s best offering, namely, the Travel Channel. I do.
The Travel Channel, you see, reliably reports and depicts only good things happening everywhere. Be it Iceland or Greece, from which only bad news has emanated lately, or California, Louisiana or New York City, when the people from the Travel Channel go there they will unfailingly bring their viewers good news. This would be news of wonderful beaches, great hotels, opportunities for quirky adventure, the best cuisine, outstanding shopping, health and fitness options and similar positive things everyone can use, or at least use to learn about, when the official news reports from every mainstream source give us virtually nothing but heartache.
I have for a long time assumed that the practice of official news outfits of any sort is to try to scare us to death, to make us pay attention by telling us that we are all doomed, no matter what, no matter who one is. The politicians, of course, love this because they can then proceed to offer their magic to have it all fixed for us in a jiffy, never mind that it is mostly lies and more lies.
So there is, as I see it, a severely negative bias in the news. Just consider, as a test, that even if there is a horrible plane crash someplace or a bomb scare, thousands of other places are safe and millions and millions of people get to where they wanted to go without a hitch. But this is never mentioned on “the news,” perhaps understandably. But it does produce major distortions in reports of how the world is doing.
So as a corrective, one needs the discipline and personal initiative to seek out some good news, some antidote to all the reports of crises. A little of this is achieve when one encounters advertisements, of course, since ads also focus on what is good about life, hoping that this will stimulate some interest in the products and services being offered for sale. The bottom line, though, is simple. Make sure that you know of good stuff, that as much as possible you make room for it in your life.
This is my pitch for rational selfishness today, even while I know that it is not the full story. But I recommend that it be a significant portion of it for everyone.
Column on Ayn Rand & Libertarianism
Dec 14th
Rand and Libertarianism
Tibor R. Machan
The question still comes up, “What does Rand have to Contribute to Libertarianism?” Of course, late in her life Rand tried to disassociate herself from libertarians, whom she called “hippies of the Right.” In fact, of course, what she found most objectionable about libertarians is their alleged disdain for a philosophical foundation for their political ideas and ideals. Rand was convinced that philosophy matters very much in the defense of a free society. She stressed, moreover, that in the last analysis she was not a capitalist, not an egoist, not even an individualist but, first and foremost, a champion of human reason. From this, she argued, one can infer most of what really matters to us all, including the vital importance of a free society.
Libertarians, however, tend to want to have an open door policy–they don’t want to exclude people from the rank of those who defend liberty even if their defense is wrong or weak or really badly put. Be you a Moonie or Christian or even socialist in your personal viewpoint, libertarians want to extend an invitation to you. This seems only sensible, strategically prudent–it will swell the ranks of those who will support human liberty, never mind why. Yes, hippies, too, were welcome and still are, as are Mormons and prostitutes and bowlers. The more the merrier. It is quantity that matters, not quality, since libertarianism is a political movement, primarily. It needs to have its supporters swell in numbers as far as possible.
Rand, however, believed that without the best case for liberty, liberty would lose out no matter how good the numbers. No ill founded doctrine of liberty can hold up against all the attacks from the various sophists who are eager to show how flimsy the defense of human liberty really is. Today it is the communitarian, especially, who mounts a sophisticated case against freedom by first attempting to discredit elements of libertarianism such as individualism. For Rand unless a sound case for these elements exist, it makes no difference how large the number of libertarians is. In the end it is the soundness of the argument that matters most, or so she believed, because she held that human beings are rational animals and only when ultimately something appeals to their reason, will they give it long term support.
One aspect of Rand’s position that has not managed to make itself heard clearly is her view that what you think isn’t the result of your personal history and, indeed, this idea follows the long appreciated view of most philosophers that one ought not to commit the genetic fallacy, of judging a viewpoint by the history and origin of those who advance it. Rand is now being more and more judged, even by sympathizes such as the authors of the two recent biographies, one from Doubleday, the other from Oxford, not so much by whether her case for her ideas is sound but by reference to her upbringing or history. Since she was raised in Soviet Russia, she is often deemed to be captive of her origins. This is nonsense, of course, considering how many others who find her ideas sound didn’t share her history at all. I did and that has been held against me by adversaries all my career, but they have used it mostly as a ploy since they new that many of those whom they embraced, refugees from right wing dictatorships, were not biased by their history, only educated by the experience of it. And that holds for the likes of Ayn Rand and me. But to acknowledge this would mean giving up a possibly effective weapon against our ideas!
But why do her recent biographers keep insisting on committing the genetic fallacy? I think the reason is that contemporary biographies are all written under the influence of scientism, the view that everything must be explained (away?) by means of efficient causes in a person’s life–upbringing, nutrition, climate, economy (a la Marx), psychology (a law Freud), etc. To understand Ayn Rand, then, amounts to have explained her along such lines. This is what is demanded by modern (mechanistic) science (though not by contemporary science, which has largely shed its mechanist premises).
There is an important scholar of recent times who fought against such a way of understanding thinkers of the past. Leo Strauss, of the University of Chicago’s Committee of Social Thought, insisted that those who try to understand Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, and many other great thinkers by these means fail miserably and miss out on their valuable teachings. And, of course, they are also facing a fatal paradox: If the subjects of their study are to be understood by explaining away their thinking, then so must be the biographers, as well. And that would leave truth out of the equation completely.
